


Different Frequencies

by HerbertBest



Category: Game Grumps, Ninja Sex Party (Band)
Genre: Alien Culture, Altered Mental States, Altered States, Alternate Universes, Background Relationships, Dopplegangers, Doubles, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Gen, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Making Friends, Mild Angst, Music, Stress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-28
Updated: 2018-01-28
Packaged: 2019-03-10 12:31:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13501716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HerbertBest/pseuds/HerbertBest
Summary: Afraid of being alone, Dan instead meets yet another side of himself.





	Different Frequencies

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheseusInTheMaze](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheseusInTheMaze/gifts).



> A little spin-off of Theseus' [Variations on a Dan series.](http://archiveofourown.org/series/883554)

Dan wished he could consciously decide to show up in the room. It had been a long day, the last one recording the album, and he just closed his eyes and passed out on his couch back home. 

 

And then he was there, creeping through the pure white hallways that reminded him too much of his house. He felt that way after they finished every album and the adrenalin of creation gave way to the nothingness that sent him sprinting for home, to surround himself with friends or lovers or family members. Dan could never endure the silence and isolation of the between times, always had to have texting or Instagram or Snapchat or his family’s voices in his ears. 

Being alone with himself was the worst fate of all.

The thought made his confidence – his happy-Dan mask – was starting to wobble a little bit as he turned around and sat down on the edge of a marble-colored table. He reached into the front pocket of his white leather jacket and found his phone, plugging in his ear buds. At least music was still here for him in this weird world.

He didn’t feel another presence in the room with him until a shadow cast itself over his phone, painting it in dusty, transparent shades of darkness. Dan looked up, face scrunched in confusion.

Towering over him was a curiously-shaped but familiar-faced creature, with multiple arms and a much more ethereal shape. It projected kind peacefulness, even though it lacked eyeballs.

It resembled him, of course.

“Hello,” the creature said, tilting its head. Pale blue skin glowed phosphorant in the low light, and tentacles feathered out into the air. “What an odd device you have!”

Dan’s mouth fell open two minutes before he let out a piercing scream.

 

*** 

 

“You move him!”

“No, you!”

Dan moaned, blinking into the white light over his head. Hovering over his feet was Danny, with one of the Unicorn Dans, who was arguing passionately with Alex. Dan could tell them all apart at a glance now, and he didn’t know if that was a positive thing. He sat up, and the men around him made querulous, conflicting sounds of anxiety. 

“Did I hurt him?” a melodious voice asked from somewhere behind him. “I had no idea humans could be so sensitive! Neither of you reacted so harshly to my appearance!”

Dan glanced at Danny, who stared at the alien with that typically blank expression of his, and then looked at Alex, whose foggy eyes and pungent odor suggested he’d been taking bong rips before he’d shown up here. 

He decided to save face by himself. “It’s cool, it’s cool,” Dan said. Then to the alien behind him, “I didn’t mean to be a jerk. I was just kind of surprised when I saw you. What’s your name, man?”

The Alien’s arms wove, and his chest puffed up with pride. “I’m D!n!” he said with some pride, “of the Universe to the Left of the Oankali and…”

“…You’re a Zognoid,” Dan realized, feeling a bittersweet pang in his chest.

The alien tilted his head to the side. “What a curiously succinct observation. Correct, I am a Zognoid.”

Memories teased Dan’s senses. He pushed them back. “That’s cool. Uh…do you get here the way everyone else does?”

“Just zap and you’re here?”

“Yep.”

“Indubitably.” 

“Uh, so if you’re gonna be okay, me and Danny have a um…thing,” said Alex, squirming, red-eyed, his hand tapping unicorn Danny’s oversized hoof.

Dan raised an eyebrow. “Are you two…with each other?”

“We’re together in that we take part in the the unity and brotherhood of mankind!” said Alex. “And we’re going out on a date.” The Unicorn preened proudly beside him, and surprisingly didn’t fight off Alex’s needy statement.

Dan felt like his brain was popping and blowing at the very concept, but smiled as the twosome left the room. “What about you?” he asked Danny.

He scoffed. “No person or carbon-based thing will ever tie Danny Sexbang down!” He headed out of the room, “I’m gonna find a sandwich and then I’m gonna fuck it!”

“Have…fun with that,” Dan remarked, shaking his head as Danny strode out of the room. That left Dan alone with D!n, a prospect that seemed less intimidating than it once had as the alien wrung its multiple hands together.

He searched for a way to break the ice and it came to him out of the blue. “Do you listen to music on your planet?” he asked, holding up his phone and offering up his earbuds. 

“Of course,” said D!n. “We prefer the sound of saws whining and the melodious chanting of the snardlepiffer chorales.”

“If you like that, you’ll love Rush!” Dan said. He worked with his phone and told D!n to plug the earphones into whatever he called ears. The alien did as he requested – more like wrapping the buds in its sensory tentacles - and Dan pressed play.

The Zognoid shrieked in alarm and jerked the headphones away from…well, they looked like hits knees but Dan supposed they were his ears. “What on earth is that noise?” D!n asked.

“That’s Rush…only my favorite band in the world.” Dan turned the music down. “Do you hate it that much?”

“It sounds like zinglegorgs being stabbed!” Dan blinked. “They’re very small catlike objects. I do understand what you human mean.”

“Yeah, right,” Dan said. “I don’t know how it could…” he looked at the volume controls. “Oh…” He turned it down and asked the Zognoid if that sounded better.

And it seemed that it did. The entity's pale face turned a pleased shade of pink and he began to move to the music. “This is pleasing to my Zognodian tentacles,” D!n said.

“Do you mind if I?” Dan gestured, unplugging the phone so they could both listen.

“Not at all!” said D!n.

Dan lost track of how long they sat together peacefully listening to Rush and letting time pass.

But by the time he woke up in his own bed, he was smiling.


End file.
